Unit 1 : Working in Fashion

The above list highlight how many different areas there are for work within the fashion industry. Design, buying and selling at wholesale, manufacturing, merchandising, styling…

• Farmer
When I talk about farmers, I’m thinking of those who are at the start of the natural fibre

process. Growing the cotton or flax. Taking care of sheep for their wool. The farmers are where the entire fashion production line starts.

• Fibre processing

From processing the natural fibres – learn how cotton is made into fabric here – right down to creating the man-made and synthetic ones, fibre processing is the next stage in the fashion production line.

This includes the spinning of fibres so that they can be knitted or woven later on.

• Trend Forecaster
Trend forecasting is a huge business. WGSN is one of the bigger trend forecasters, and

they will develop color trends years ahead of a fashion collection being designed.

• Textile Designer

Textile design is a multi-niche area. As well as a 2D textile designer, working in a sketchbook or on a computer to generate textile designs, there are more hands on textile designers working on knit, weave and print designs.

Some of the jobs included in this area are:

• −  Surface print designer
• −  Weaving designer
  Cours d’anglais de la Mode – ProFashion Language 4

• −  Knit designer
• −  Embroidery designerAs well as being specialised in one of the above, a textile designer will also have an understanding of how textiles are created generally – dyeing, yarns, fabric types!

• Fashion Designer
A fashion designer is someone who designs clothing in either 2D or 3D.

If they are designing within the ready to wear market, they are likely to work with a particular garment ‘type’:

• −  Separates
• −  Tailoring
• −  Outerwear
• −  Sportwear
• −  Occasionwear
• −  And more…Or they may work for a higher end fashion house or their own fashion brand, and design the entire collection each season. In this case they may:

• −  Create moodboards to help keep the collection consistent with an overall theme or aesthetic
• −  Design 2 dimensionally on paper / computer
• −  Drape fabric to develop design ideas
• −  Develop patternsThe fashion designer is often inspired by textiles that they have sources, but it can also be that the textiles are designed and created to fit the fashion designers vision. Examples are pleating and embroidery.

• Pattern Cutter

In the UK they’re called pattern cutters, in the US and elsewhere pattern makers. Essentially, the job of the pattern cutter is to take the two dimensional designs from the fashion designer and create basic patterns.

They’ll start with the closest house block if there is one, and if not, they may take a pattern for a previous design and develop that into a new pattern.

• Sample Machinist / Seamstress

Once the pattern cutter has created a pattern, it needs to be sewn into a basic toile by the sample machinist or seamstress so that the fashion designer can see whether the design is as they envisioned.

It will be sewn in a fabric of a similar weight on the first go, and in the sample fabric afterwards.

• Grader

Once the design has been sampled and the final pattern created with any necessary adjustments, it is graded for production. This happens after fashion shows when there is an idea of quantities needed to fulfil sales.

• Fashion Illustrator

Part of the design process, designers will often illustrate their collections themselves, or outsource it. Illustrations can form part of the marketing process, providing a more creative and stylised vision than a photograph of a design.

• Fashion Photographer

A fashion photographer is used to accurately depict the designs for the sales look book and any online sales website, but also to create a ‘mood’ but shooting the collection in a way that emulates the designer’s original vision.

• Fashion Buyers
Whether the collections are shown at a fashion week or with a look book, fashion buyers

will need to see a line sheet to place their orders.

A fashion buyer is aware of the trends and the seasons but also has to stick within a budget and consider their ideal customers needs.

• Fashion Merchandisers

If the collection is being sold to a store with multiple branches, they’ll have a merchandiser who il make sure that there is stock in the right store at the right time, and will co-ordinate sales.

• Fashion Stylists

A fashion stylist joins the line early on during the design process, helping the designer to style a collection. But can also arrive later to the party, helping to style fashion for magazine shoots and more

• Fashion Marketers
Marketing fashion is key to generating awareness and sales. From marketing campaigns and shows, a fashion marketer will also be in charge of social media marketing too.

• Fashion Sales
Whether the lead on updating managing an online sales channel or in the store or boutique selling directly to customers, fashion sales is where the money happens.